Former Utah guardsman gets 12 years for child porn

Sep. 14, 2013 - 06:00AM
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SALT LAKE CITY — A decorated former soldier and Utah guardsman from Park City was ordered Thursday to spend 12 years in federal prison in a child pornography case, and must also pay nearly $600,000 in restitution to a woman who was featured in some of the images he shared.

Michael Loren Dunn, who was a systems administrator in the Army and did a tour in Iraq, was found guilty in January of possessing, receiving and distributing child pornography.

“I’m ashamed, deeply ashamed, and I’m sorry for everyone and anyone I’ve hurt,” said Dunn, who was also ordered to serve 25 years on probation. “There’s nobody to blame but me.”

Dunn’s attorney, Kim Trupiano, argued at trial that her client had stumbled upon child pornography while searching for the adult version and immediately deleted those files, but U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby said he didn’t buy the argument.

Some of the pornography depicted a then-10-year-old girl known as “Vicky,” who was bound, raped and sodomized by her father while cameras rolled.

Now 21, Vicky wrote the court to explain how she has suffered panic attacks, insomnia and paranoia after learning four years ago that videos of her abuse were making the rounds online.

“I feel totally out of control. They are trading around my trauma like treats at a party, and it feels like I am being raped all over again by every one of them,” Vicky wrote. “So many nights I have cried myself to sleep thinking of a stranger somewhere staring at their computer with images of a naked me on the screen. I have nightmares about it often.”

Vicky has been identified as a victim in 477 child pornography cases to date across the country. She was awarded $1.3 million in an initial case and has received about $716,000 so far, but is seeking the remainder from others convicted of possessing or distributing images of her.

Trupiano said Dunn doesn’t have enough money to pay the $583,955 restitution, so the judge agreed he could pay $15 a month while he’s in prison and $200 a month when he’s released. Dunn’s share of the payment could be reduced if others are ordered to pay.

While Dunn didn’t produce the pornography, he contributed to Vicky’s repeated victimization, according to Jeff Zeeman, an attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice Child Exploitation and Obscenity Section.

“He made her image available to hundreds of thousands of people on the Internet,” Zeeman said.